


not afraid to let it shine on me

by womanaction



Category: New Girl
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-13
Updated: 2018-01-13
Packaged: 2019-03-04 02:20:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13354443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/womanaction/pseuds/womanaction
Summary: Nick and Schmidt have a weird heart to heart after the events of 1x16 "Control." Blame it on the full moon.





	not afraid to let it shine on me

**Author's Note:**

> I completely ignored everything that was Schmidt/Cece about this episode (my original plan was to do a full on rewrite but I didn't like it), so...assume none of that was happening. Also this is ridiculous fluff, sorry.
> 
> Prompt from Tumblr: moon - the things you said in the middle of the night

“Hey, Schmidty…”

Schmidt knows that tone of voice. He knows exactly what it signifies. Really, he knows every possible tone and inflection in the limited oral vocabulary of one Nicholas Miller. This tone? This is the talking-to-a-scared-baby-animal tone, the one he uses when he thinks Schmidt is “freaking out” and “being crazy.” He always wants to find it condescending, but Nick is far too genuine when he uses it.

So he cracks one eye open. Nick is towering over him, an illusion made possible by the fact that Schmidt is lying down. On a bed, he realizes fuzzily, about the same time that he becomes aware that his hands don’t feel hand-textured.

Schmidt sits up suddenly and immediately ascertains what’s wrong with his hands. His gloves. He fell asleep with his cleaning gloves on. He hastily pulls them off, trying to look as composed as possible. Now Nick is watching him curiously, like he’s some seven-year-old kid at the monkey house in the zoo. Rubbing his dirty little face against the glass. Disgusting.

“Can I help you?” Schmidt asks, perturbed. He can’t really put his finger on why he’s peeved at Nick, but he assumes the reason will come to mind in a minute. God, did he really fall asleep with his shoes on? Is he a homeless person who’s afraid his shoes will get stolen?

“You could get out of my bed!” Nick says, a little roughly and, by the expression on his face, louder than he intended.

That’s ridiculous. He wouldn’t touch Nick’s bed without a thorough…

 _Cleaning_ , right. That’s what he’d been doing in here. It had taken him about twice as long to clean Nick’s room as it had to clean every other room in the loft put together, but by God, he’d done it. He must have been so exhausted after staying up all night playing drums that he passed out.

“What time is it?” he asks, not quite looking at Nick. His best friend is still giving him that slightly pitying, slightly exasperated look. He should really patent it.

Nick clears his throat a little. “Uh, it’s about one-thirty.”

“One-thirty? In the morning? Why wake me up at all?”

“Well, where was I supposed to sleep, huh, Schmidt?”

 _In here with me, you doofus_ , is his immediate thought, but thankfully Nick is already going on about the last time he slept in Schmidt’s room and how he threw his dirty socks under the bed and Schmidt yelled at him but where else were they supposed to go? He was too _fancy_ to have a hamper…

“The laundry creel is in the closet,” he answers automatically.

Nick makes that bewildered, what-the-hell-is-wrong-with-you face. Then his expression softens a little and he sits on the edge of the bed. “It’s, uh…it’s good to have you back, Schmidt,” he says, suddenly earnest.

Schmidt tries to play it cool, even though Nick’s eyes are very brown and he’s suddenly aware of how late it is. “Pff, yeah. You’re welcome,” he says, gesturing at their now immaculate surroundings.

“No, it’s not – it’s not about the cleaning, Schmidt,” Nick says, frustrated. “Come on. You know I’m going to mess it all up by tomorrow. This was all for you. I’m just glad you’re…you, again.”

Schmidt imagines, for a second, that Nick brushes his hand against Schmidt’s jawline. It wouldn’t happen, of course. Nick is not that guy, the kind of guy to just casually touch a friend’s face to express an emotion. But Schmidt knows what his hands feel like well enough, so he can imagine it. “Me too,” he says honestly, and Nick grins a little.

Then he frowns, like he’s trying to make up his mind about something. Schmidt hopes it’s not about brushing his teeth – how many times does he have to remind Nick that it’s not optional? – but instead Nick asks, “Hey Schmidty, do you think it’s a full moon or something?”

Before he has a chance to answer, Nick’s face is closer to his. A _lot_ closer. He can feel the warmth of Nick Miller’s face on his face and then he can feel more than that because Nick has just kissed him.

It’s over before Schmidt really has a chance to process anything, and he knows he’s gaping and that gaping isn’t even in his top 20 of most attractive faces he can make (he thinks it’s somewhere along #34, which is so far down it’s like, why does his face even do that?) but he’s just utterly baffled. Nick pulls away, looking equally shell-shocked. “Why did you do that?” Schmidt asks, heart pounding in his ears.

“Uh…I don’t know. Just kind of wanted to.”

“That’s not a reason, Nick, give me a real reason-”

“Uh, _I don’t know._ Just kind of wanted to!” Nick repeats at a louder volume, standing up and pacing a little away. “It’s probably a full moon or something, like I said.”

“A full moon – A full moon doesn’t make you kiss people and then not explain it, Nicholas!”

“I’m not an astrologer!”

Nick is disappearing out the door by the time Schmidt thinks to yell after him. “Hey! Don’t you moonwalk away from me! …This is your room!”


End file.
